Given the great job they did creating the world of Jade Empire, I'm glad their next game is going to be set in another universe of their creation. I do hope they'll do a sequel to Jade Empire someday, even though they're not keen on sequels.

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"Why did the chicken cross the Mobius strip? To get to the same side." - The Big Bang Theory

.... I'm no longer sure Bioware has what it takes to deliver. Could it be that Black Isle was the magic? The evidence seems to indicate that is the case.

I'd agree that Black Isle was a good partnering with them. Black Isle and Interplay/Titus over them made mistakes of their own with the liscense property and the business relationship. Black Isle games always had brilliant backstories and atmospheres that to my tastes have yet to be matched. I still have some small faith in Bioware's ability, but I have lowered my expectations on their productions as well, because they are handling more of the production than they did back when.

I think another thing is (No offense to any poster here who might hold the same name or be employed by said company) Atari stinks as a publisher. Atari stunk when they were Infrogrames, and they will still stink after they are no longer Atari. Too often this publisher, no matter what name it has at the time, pushes their development teams to release something in whatever state the build is in currently, in the hopes that whatever steaming pile they master for copy distribution can be patched towards some level of functionality later. Temple of Elemental Evil and Trokia, I'm looking at you.

Bioware in the Infinity Engine titles did the nuts and bolts, Black Isle did the art, the unique items, the voice/sounds, and the story. Now Bioware does all of it while Atari signs some checks, copies and distributes the CDs, and asks if the project is done yet. Not as a supportive a parnership with Atari as they enjoyed at a time with Black Isle Studios.

And this is not to say that Trokia doesn't have itts own reputation for heavily patched and less than functional game releases. They owned a considerable part of ToEE's shame as well.

I just put low expectations on Atari made games, Bioware project or not.

Bioware in the Infinity Engine titles did the nuts and bolts, Black Isle did the art, the unique items, the voice/sounds, and the story.

Pretty sure this is wrong if you are referring to BG 1&2. Bioware did the majority of what you listed except for the voice and sounds which I think BI took care of. It sounds like you're only referring to Icewind Dale 1&2 and Torment which only licensed the Infinity Engine. Again, this doesn't apply to the Baldur's Gate series.

Bioware in the Infinity Engine titles did the nuts and bolts, Black Isle did the art, the unique items, the voice/sounds, and the story.

Pretty sure this is wrong if you are referring to BG 1&2. Bioware did the majority of what you listed except for the voice and sounds which I think BI took care of. It sounds like you're only referring to Icewind Dale 1&2 and Torment which only licensed the Infinity Engine. Again, this doesn't apply to the Baldur's Gate series.

Kevin, as usual, has this completely correct. I believe BI also provided some QA and some "bouncing ideas off each other" for story and such.

Bioware in the Infinity Engine titles did the nuts and bolts, Black Isle did the art, the unique items, the voice/sounds, and the story.

Pretty sure this is wrong if you are referring to BG 1&2. Bioware did the majority of what you listed except for the voice and sounds which I think BI took care of. It sounds like you're only referring to Icewind Dale 1&2 and Torment which only licensed the Infinity Engine. Again, this doesn't apply to the Baldur's Gate series.

The BG series I'll conceed that I might not know as well, but it is as you say for all of those Icewind Dale games and their multiple expansions, as well as for PSTorment. Not that the Black Isle contributions to the BG series were minimal, they were just not as great as I thought I had understood them. Those voice and sounds were top shelf in BG2 especially, and their provision of QA was stellar compared to those D&D offerings from UbiSoft and Troika. At the time of BG2:TOB, the Win XP OS was only just coming into poularity on the market, so that could not have made the job easier for testing the game for Win 98SE, Win ME, and Win 2000, and Win XP. What a mountain to climb.

Being wrong as such I was, I can't say I feel better about the difference in quality as it transitioned from BG2:TOB to Neverwinter Nights and the original campaign. In fact, it makes me lose even a little more faith, sad to say.

Being wrong as such I was, I can't say I feel better about the difference in quality as it transitioned from BG2:TOB to Neverwinter Nights and the original campaign. In fact, it makes me lose even a little more faith, sad to say.

I'll disagree here. I think NWN is a phenomenal game. The OC wasn't up to Bioware standards (yet still good enough that I logged over 40 hours in it) but their support of the community has ensured NWN as a game that has never left my HDD since installation, something that can't be said for any of their other games (or Black Isle for that matter). And both of the expansions, particularly the Bioware developed Hordes of the Underdark, were stellar.

I'd also rank KOTOR right up there with BG2. Jade Empire is the only Bioware game I feel that was any actual drop in quality.

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Those voice and sounds were top shelf in BG2 especially, and their provision of QA was stellar compared to those D&D offerings from UbiSoft and Troika.

The voices and sounds in KOTOR were every bit as good as those in any of their Black Isle games. And I wouldn't be so quick to hold Interplay as a paragon of good QA: Fallout 2 in particular was a notoriously buggy mess and need I mention Descent to Undermountain?

Count me in the camp of folks that loved NWN, and still has it installed on my PC (for the reasons Kevin outlined).

BG2 was great, but almost too big of a game - as somebody who has to complete every quest he's ever presented in a RPG, I felt frustrated/lost trying to keep track of the exponentially increasing amount of side/subquests the game rained on me....

And I wouldn't be so quick to hold Interplay as a paragon of good QA: Fallout 2 in particular was a notoriously buggy mess and need I mention Descent to Undermountain?

Both were before my time, and DtU was before Black Isle was its own division., and I know Fallout was before Black Isle, perhaps Fallout 2 as well? Those games and the employees on those teams led to the organization of BIS.

As another poster pointed out though, I'm no longer sure Bioware has what it takes to deliver. Could it be that Black Isle was the magic? The evidence seems to indicate that is the case.

Loving NWN was not the question. The continuing, admittedly high-quality product suppport of NWN was not the question, nor the quality expansion pack made by Floodgate that contained work that led into the Hordes of the Underdark

The Quality of that original campaign was where Black Isle Studios quality work was first missed from a Bioware product, and notably so. This is the whole reason for the tangent we're on.

Bioware does a lot of things better than anybody in the industry, product support HIGh amongst them. I'm just arguing developing a property without collaboration with an outside development studio, extensively or only in limited parts, is at the least not as strong a quality to their credit, if it is a strong quality at all. After Orginal campaign NWN, and Jade Empire, I'm suspicious. If Dragon Age turns out to continue the trend in that same direction, it will not suprise me after what I see.

Bioware makes better games than most game makers and has done the same for years, but that wasn't the question I was asked.

The Quality of that original campaign was where Black Isle Studios quality work was first missed from a Bioware product, and notably so. This is the whole reason for the tangent we're on.

How do you figure? I think the lackluster NWN campaign had little to do with the absence of Black Isle and everything to do with the fact that Bioware put far more resources into the NWN toolset than the campaign. I serioiusly doubt Black Isle's involvement would have changed that allocation. And considering that Bioware's next campaign focused RPG was KOTOR, a title I hold in just as high esteem as BG2, then that further tells me that the lackluster NWN campaign was due to the toolset focus of NWN, something that wasn't a concern in any of the BG games.

And loving NWN is the issue for me since the topic really seems to be whether Bioware has lost something since the Black Isle days. Considering that KOTOR, NWN, and BG2 all probably rank in my top ten RPGs then I wouldn't hesistate to say that with the exception of Jade Empire only, Bioware's product is just as good as it's ever been.

And loving NWN is the issue for me since the topic really seems to be whether Bioware has lost something since the Black Isle days. Considering that KOTOR, NWN, and BG2 all probably rank in my top ten RPGs then I wouldn't hesistate to say that with the exception of Jade Empire only, Bioware's product is just as good as it's ever been.

Than I am glad to conclude it here, knowing that we are debating whollly different things. Thanks for your opinions. hope you enjoyed mine.

All of Bioware's RPGs have excelled at different things. In BG2, the gameplay (mostly the battles) were paramount, while character development and story were minimal. In NWN, they made a great toolset that opened up RPG creation to a large number of people, producing many outstanding modules. KoTOR (like Blizzard with StarCraft) showed they could craft a great story and memorable characters, and Jade Empire showed they could build a beautiful, original, and memorable world without a big license to fall back on.

I'm not the biggest fan of NWN, but I think the rest of the games are some of the best ever made, and I don't think they've lost anything. Personally, I'd rather have good gameplay with great characters and story in an RPG than great gameplay and merely good characters and story. Hopefully, someday they'll be able to capitalize on all their strengths in one game.

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"Why did the chicken cross the Mobius strip? To get to the same side." - The Big Bang Theory

Tne thing I dont like about Bioware games is the fact that they are all 'real time'. As far as I am concerned, TB>real time in CRPG combat. No question, not even close.

You do know that you can play them as TB if you like? There are plenty of options for pausing between turns. The Bioware games always struck me as being more TB in their execution than real RT, like they just made TB games and took out the pauses.

Well they like to say there is a TB mechanic underneath the surface of their combat systems (at least for all their games before JE), but it isnt the same as a traditional TB combat system. All the other bullshit and half-assedness aside, TToEE is the pinacle of TB CRPG combat for my money and that plays nothing at all like a Bioward game no matter what kind of pause options you have enabled.